Outbreak, Outbreak, Outbreak
by Unbroken Record
Summary: During the City 17 uprising, while an Overwatch Soldier's squad falls one by one, he reflects upon his past. What happens afterwards will determine his future. Rated T for violence, insinuated gore and harsh language. First fic, be merciful.


**(This is a prologue to my Half-Life 2 fanfic, lengthily titled "Outbreak, Outbreak, Outbreak" as you can see. To clear a few things up, no, I don't own Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Gordon Freeman, the Combine, City 17, Overwatch dispatcher, AR2 Pulse Rifles or basically anything else in this story apart from the character from whose point of view the story is told. The rest of it belongs to Valve Corporation. PRAISE BE.)  
**

This was beginning to get ridiculous.

**"Anticitizen One in vicinity--"**

That particular Overwatch Soldier's garbled, electronically altered speech was abruptly cut off as a table flew at his head, his reinforced neck unable to withstand the force and going limp with a tell-all snapping noise. His remaining squad mates backed into the room, taking positions behind machinery, couches, the lot. All optics on the doorway. This would give them an advantage against him. But he just wasn't giving up. A brief glimpse of orange and grey armour and a flash of red light and a grenade dropped at the side of another of the startled soldiers, beeping thrice before blowing him apart.

"**Overwatch, be advised. Sector's not secure."**

Oh, this sector was definitely_ not secure. _What was most baffling is how he'd managed to infiltrate the Overwatch Nexus, the second most secure building in City 17, and not only survive but manage to disable two of the generators for the Suppression Device. He was going for the third one, which happened to be in the room this squad was in. Their AR2s were still and silent, and the squad leader began steadily making his way towards the doorway, shotgun in hands. At which point Target Freeman stepped out, took the squad leader's head off with his own shotgun, then retreated back into cover.

"**Overwatch, be advised, squad leader down. Control on Nexus disputed. Request reserve activation." **TOS-S17-CW04352 said as he checked his ammunition. One spare magazine and about twelve rounds left in his current one. At this rate, that would be gone very quickly. He had his back pressed against a pillar, his face positioned so he could get a decent look out while being protected from enemy fire. Standard tactical manoeuvre for this sort of structure. He listened carefully for both a response from Overwatch dispatch and any movement on the side of the hostiles.

"_Request analysed. Acknowledged. Confirmed. Further treatment for affected area has been deployed."_

He looked up as he caught motion in the corner of his eye and saw that there was another Anticitizen moving in, this one a standard rebel with an SMG1 in his filthy mitts. So Target Freeman had backup. CW04352 took aim and fired a quick, six round burst at the rebel's chest while he was firing from the hip at one of the other Soldiers. The bullets ripped through the tactical vest he'd presumably scavenged from a downed CP and in turn, ripped open his chest cavity, sending him to the floor like a sack of bricks. It was slightly disconcerting to know that the vests were that flimsy, but then again, any CP had every opportunity to join the Transhuman Overwatch. CW04352 knew that his armour was much sturdier. Had that been why he had joined?

He decided to leave that question unanswered. It wasn't worth pondering. In the words of the Overwatch dispatch, aberrant thought would be amputated and expunged. Something along those lines anyway. He twitched and looked leftwards as he heard quiet movement. His last remaining squad mate was creeping towards the doorway, crouched, his AR2 held ready. He glanced at CW04352, who nodded in response, signalling that he had him covered. Another rebel with an SMG appeared and the two of them put the fugitive down, but not before the Anticitizen managed to press another trigger on the foregrip. There was a _tha-dunk _noise followed by a loud, bright explosion, and the next time CW04352 looked, it quickly came to his attention that he was the last member of his squad alive.

"**Outbreak! Outbreak! Outbreak!"** He bellowed into his ballistic mask's internal radio. This was bad… _very_ bad. CW04352 had never been in an Outbreak-class situation in his entire career in the Overwatch. In retrospect, his career seemed to be rather… brief. It would be a terrible shame to die now, this soon into his service of the Universal Union. Wait, brief? That couldn't be right. He could remember a very lengthy career of very standard excursions in the past, mostly patrols and surgical strikes, the results of which were rather predictable. But it almost seemed like he had to think about his past to remember those. In fact, it seemed as though it was only two weeks ago when he first came out of Nova Prospekt…

Amputated and expunged, he reminded himself as he clutched his AR2 to his chest. It was a wonder that they hadn't acted while he was stuck on that train of thought. Hepeered out from behind cover. No activity. He could recall that the last time Anticitizen One had made himself visible, he'd moved to the right side of the doorway to conceal himself again. Even if the rest of the hostiles - he wasn't sure how many there were, but at a rough guess there were around 5, Freeman included - were unfazed by the grenade, killing or even wounding the most dangerous man in the Resistance was sure to be something to remembered by. He smiled to himself, and felt as though he hadn't done so in so long. CW04352 brought up his grenade, pulled the pin, cocked his arm back and counted--

There was a sudden blur of dark grey and white as a man wearing what CW04352 recognised as a CP uniform sans ballistic mask rushed out from the left side of the doorframe with an AR2. A traitor, he thought. Two distinctive gunshots, a brief flash at the muzzle, two flares of intense pain in his wrist and the grenade had slipped from his hands. Grabbing at his wounded arm, he violently kicked the grenade in the direction the bullets had came. Then Anticitizen One stepped out of cover, and seemed to… catch the grenade with this strange, glowing orange device, which CW04352 had never seen anything of the sort in the past. Or had he? It felt as though he'd seen that around somewhere. In the hands of that Vance kid, he thought. Wait, no, he hadn't even encountered _Subprime Vance_ in the past two weeks… _in his career…_

The device made a strange noise and flashed. Freeman seemed to feel the recoil. CW04352 saw the grenade flying back in his direction.

"**SHIT!"**

He let out a distorted cry as the grenade sent him backwards into a wall. He could feel that his armour had been torn up, and there was a large crack in his mask. Apparently, the Overwatch issue didn't protect against _that. _He guessed it just wasn't designed for explosions at that range. Couldn't really blame whoever made it. The crippling pains in his torso told him that he'd received a nasty helping of shrapnel. His InterMed systems worked ceaselessly to medicate his wounds as he lay there, prone, wounded and in the eyes of an observer, dead. It was good that he no longer needed to breathe with lungs. His augmentations did that for him now. His augmentations. The ones he'd gotten at Nova Prospekt. Nova Prospekt. What had happened at Nova Prospekt? Nova Prospekt. Nova Prospekt…

He felt light-headed and numb, which was either a sign that he was losing so much blood that his brain wasn't getting any, or his InterMed had administered morphine. As he drifted in and out of consciousness, he saw Freeman walk past him, and that traitor in the CP uniform. There was also a single, standard rebel with them, who seemed to peer down at him and prod him a bit to see if he was dead. His face was strangely familiar, like the strange gun Freeman had used, but it felt as though he'd known him longer… but he didn't. He could remember nothing about him, and he certainly hadn't seen any Rebel up that close in the past two weeks who was still alive. And he wasn't in any position to get up and ask, because he was successfully, albeit forcefully, feigning death. No, all that would get him is a bullet to the head, which his damaged mask wouldn't withstand and his InterMed couldn't really do anything about. So he lied there, still and thinking until they left, after accomplishing whatever they wanted to do. Then, still feeling hazy, he reached for an adjacent medkit.

**(So, you had the courtesy to endure through reading that, or at least scroll to the bottom of the page. I appreciate it. This is the first piece of fiction I've ever published online on anything other than forums for small social groups, so go easy on me. A few notes in relation to the story itself:**

**- Yes, I'm aware that Overwatch Soldiers have had their memories wiped and had something done to their mind to make them inhuman. If you didn't realise, the effects of this process were beginning to fail for CW.**

**-TOS-S17-CW04352 stands for Transhuman Overwatch Soldier, Sector Seventeen, and then his personal designation. No, he won't be called that forever. Really. It's a pain to type every time.**

**-The "InterMed" thing is a bit of fanwank on my part. It's my way of explaining how Overwatch soldiers continue to fight and function normally in the game, even when their health is depleting, until they actually die. If you've seen the pictures of Overwatch soldiers sans body armour, then the InterMed would be located underneath the metal panels that cover their abdomenal area.  
**

**R&R will be rewarded and _caaaaaaaake _will be served.)**


End file.
